Gov. Kotek pulls plug on tolls in Portland metro

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Gov. Tina Kotek said she’s decided to pause the work of Oregon’s toll collection program, noting it’s not a decision she took lightly and fully aware it will create a funding problem in the near term.

In a Monday letter to Julie Brown and Lee Beyer of the Oregon Transportation Commission, the governor said it was time to end the work of the Regional Mobility Pricing Project and “delay additional expenditures for implementation of tolling on I-205 to the future.”

But, Kotek said, the “delay of building tolling infrastructure in Oregon must not impact the collection of toll revenues for the Interstate Bridge Replacement project.” She wants the commission and ODOT to work with Washington and the federal government “to keep this important project on track.”

In announcing her decision, the governor said she is “confident that a more robust conversation on funding options will yield greater understanding and direction for our future moving forward.”

One of the critical funding challenges is for ODOT itself. These “catastrophic” challenges will be “tackled head on” in the 2025 legislative session.

ODOT spokesperson Don Hamilton told KOIN 6 News in February there are discussions about different ways to fund ODOT, but nothing imminent.

“Right now, legislators are discussing different ways to change the way ODOT funding is administered,” he said at that time. “And that’s going to come up at some point in the 2025 legislative session. They’ve just had some very early preliminary conversations about what that’s going to look like. Now, whether that’s going to involve a change in the gas tax is an issue that really hasn’t come up, but that’s a possibility. But no decisions have been made on that. But that’s something for lawmakers during the 2025 session they may address.”

Kotek’s letter to the Oregon Transportation Commission came a few weeks after a new survey found a majority of Oregon voters oppose the tolls. The survey was based on ODOT’s Regional Mobility Pricing Project, which would implement tolls on Interstate 5 and Interstate 205.

In September 2023, several projects under the I-205 Improvements Project were indefinitely postponed after Kotek delayed toll collections over concerns about traffic mitigation and equitability.

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